the defeatists!

Tell It, Paul Thorn, Tell it...find the hidden song and win a prize...

"And the rally ends, inevitably, with Christie arguing with a teacher..."
Dave Weigel, Slate

What the Hell is Goin' On -- Paul Thorn

 

So, I'm listening to the news and I get to see the great Republican presidential hope, Chris Christie, shake his finger in the face of a school teacher and say something like "you people have all the money you want..." Was he talking about education in general, teachers or something else. (40-something women? Brunettes?) My initial thought was that the difference between telling it like it is and being a bully is probably when 300 pound plus politician starts sticking his finger in the face of a normal sized woman. The other thing that struck was that there's something seriously insane about a system that rewards bullies with high elective office. Now, I fully expect Christie to win re-election in New Jersey and I also think he will not have a chance in the Republican primaries, but his rise indicates the problem with electoral politics in this country. He seems to be a relatively competent guy at pulling the technocratic levers and working out compromises, but his cocky, East Coast version of the GWB smug rich guy really doesn't play well. Ultimately, I expect he'll blow up on something, and that will be that -- it won't happen prior to the election.

"Mr. President, I need to act crazy to placate these yahoos so we can eventually get some business done..."

Now, when you shake your finger in the face of someone, you're assuming a certain level of jerkdom that is seldom justified. When Governor Brewer shook her finger in the face of the President, he handled it as he has the other disrespectful acts of his presidency, and gracefully continued the conversation. Of course, given her late conversion to pragmatism on things like Medicaid expansion, it's perfectly possible that she began by saying, "Mr. President, I need to appear to be yelling at you to placate these yahoos so we ultimately get something done." No mics captured the moment. And, the governor of Arizona is not in a power position over the president of the United States. He knows that and so does she; when wildfires sweep through the brush and forests of Arizona, she'll be asking for his help and he'll be giving it. That's the way government is supposed to work.

Christie, on the other hand, chose to bully a school teacher, Melissa Tomlinson. As the Huffington Post article pointed out, she chose to respond, using the blog of a Fordham University Professor, Dr. Mark Naison's With a Brooklyn Accent, to respond  to respond. The letter is worth reading as a whole, but the response to his question, "What do YOU people Want!"is worth quoting, as is her earlier expression of mistrust and disappointment with the Christie Administration.

Why do you portray schools as failure factories? What benefit do you reap from this? Have you acquired financial promises for your future campaigns as you eye the presidential nomination? Has there been back-room meetings as you agree to divert public funds to private companies that are seeking to take over our public educational system? (Farrell emphasis)This is my theory. To accomplish all of this, you are setting up the teachers to take the blame. Unfortunately, you are not the only governor in our country that has this agenda. What do “we people' want, Governor Christie? We want our schools back. We want to teach. We want to be allowed to help these children to grow, educationally, socially, and emotionally. We want to be respected as we do this, not bullied.

One thing that struck me was the rather smugly forced smile on Mrs. Christie's face. The crowd, according to Weigel was totally against the teacher and totally for Christie. However, that pained smirk bothered me. According to Weigel, he was struck by it too, but then noticed that there was a news camera on them, and the first rule for candidates wives is to keep on smiling. Having somewhat similar roots to Christie's, I'm very used to dutiful Irish wives standing by their blowhard husbands while hubby is making an ass out of himself. I expect that she let him have it when they got home -- that is the Irish way; in public, support; in private, eviscerate mercilessly. Weigel,  is a relatively mainstream moderate conservative -- which means registered independent, voting Democrat and praying for the return of Richard Nixon or Ike. I enjoy his writing but he has obviously been bitten by the conspiracy bug, positing a doublespeak meaning and then moderating it a bit.

Most people commenting on the photo have gotten the details right, but I've noticed some (occasionally rude) remarks about the expression on Christie's wife's face. Mary Pat Christie smiled through the entire talk-off. Why? Because a local NBC News camera was facing her, capturing the scene. Two days later, I don't see any trace of the video online. Is that a statement on how ordinary the confrontation was? Possibly. I think it's also a reflection of the front-runner coverage boosting Christie as the race ends, as the polls showing him winning (with up to 37 percent of voters not even knowing who is opponent is)...

Oh man, this guy is going down big! Big I say...maybe I can slip behind this divider and escape unnoticed except for the speech I just gave...

While I don't think Christie is a likely candidate, I do think Rand Paul is going to jump in with both feet. Unfortunately, he seems to have a strange relationship with the truth, and even in retaliating, he plagarizes without attribution.  The story is pretty well known -- The Maddow show busted him for plagaizing Wikipedia in a number of speeches, specifically the entries on Gattica (really?) and Stand and Deliver. While Paul and his apologists have made this seem like some linguistic trick on the part of "haters" the speeches used the language word for word. He mentioned the movies, which makes sense because otherwise his comments would have no context. But he didn't mention the fact that his text was from Wikipedia. Anyone who has written a term paper, and Paul states that he has written professional articles for scientific journals so he's got the merit badge in references, knows that if you use text verbatim except very incidentally, you need to give credit. He didn't. He now says he'll do better but he didn't do anything wrong.  Well, no. If I were grading the text of his speeches, and the text of his book which lifted some pieces of a Heritage Foundation Tome, or his op-eds, he might not get an F but no higher than a C, assuming that he could convince me it was all inadvertent. However, let's just say, ok, technical foul, Joe Biden made the same sort of inadvertent mistake and 20 years later he gets to be Vice President. Since being a board certified opthamologist from a board of which he was the only member was his primary qualification to be Senator, I suspect that Dr. Paul can use some more seasoning, so in 20 years he can run Vice President and this will all be forgotten. However, that might be too late.

Paul has plagiarized a response to those who accuse him of plagiarism from a retiring Democratic politician who lost it on NBC News and MSNBC for no good reason except excessive painkillers' or some other form of dementia. Dr Paul raised the issue in response to a discussion with George Stepanaopolous saying in part:

[U]nder thousands of things I’ve written, yeah, there are times when they’ve been sloppy or not correct or we’ve made an error. But the difference is I take it as an insult, and I will not lie down and say people can call me dishonest, misleading or misrepresenting. I have never intentionally done so.  And like I say, if – you know, if dueling were legal in Kentucky, if they keep it up, you know, it’d be a duel challenge. But I can’t do that because I can’t hold office in Kentucky then.

To which a Steve Benen, a staff writer on The Maddow Blog responded --

There seems to be some ongoing confusion on the senator’s part about the nature of the controversy, which may be causing him to lose his cool. Perhaps I can help by highlighting the basics: 

1. Rand Paul presented others’ work as his own several times. 

2. Rand Paul got caught. 

3. Rand Paul has not yet explained why how or why he presented others’ work as his own. 

I’m at a loss as to why this is proving to be so difficult for the senator. 

Doctors in general don't play well with others. They have to feel that they're the smartest guy or gal in the room, and any evidence to the contrary can get under their skin. Dr/Senator/Candidate/Citizen Paul is in no way a stupid man. He hasn't paid attention to his staff -- Remember the Southern Avenger? -- and either trusts them to not screw up or he doesn't really care if they do. Kind of a libertarian acceptance of man's fate? Figures that until they learn, they'll make mistakes and boy, howdy, will they be awesome then?  Like it or not, I don't believe he writes his own speeches or articles and depends on Heritage or his staff to do so. He assumes they are not screwed up and will not screw up. He's wrong.

For those you wondering what retiring Democratic politician I referred to above, Remember Zell Miller? Miller was the Democratic governor of Georgia who then was appointed to the Senate and played the Blue Dog Democratic role that so many have played. He was not against social programs, he was not a "Neo-Confederate" and he seemed to operate in the Senate in a way that was effective for the msot part However, he decided to retire from the Senate and did a farewell turn at the Republican Convention in 2004, tearing into the Democrats and accusing John Kerry and Ted Kennedy of all sorts of awful things. He came on MSNBC shortly after his speech, on Hardball and since Chris Matthews is a fairly direct interviewer, found that rather than be anointed with oil and laurel, he was going to be asked tough questions. So, he accused Matthews of being mean and attempting to brow beat him, culminating in this exchange:

MILLER:  If you‘re going to ask a question...

MATTHEWS:  Well, it‘s a tough question.  It takes a few words.

MILLER:  Get out of my face.

MILLER:  If you are going to ask me a question, step back and let me answer.

(LAUGHTER)

MATTHEWS:  Senator, please.

MILLER:  You know, I wish we...

MILLER:  I wish we lived in the day where you could challenge a person to a duel.

MILLER:  Now, that would be pretty good. 

Don‘t ask me—don‘t pull that...

(CROSSTALK)

MATTHEWS:  Can you can come over?  I need you, Senator.  Please come over.

MILLER:  Wait a minute.  Don‘t pull that kind of stuff on me, like you did that young lady when you had her there, browbeating her to death.  I am not her.  I am not her...

So, while Citizen Paul has not as yet challenged Rachel Maddow to a duel, it could still happen. However, given than Dr. Maddow was a Rhodes Scholar and multi-letter woman at Stanford I'd probably pass on the debate unless he's planning on it being on Jeopardy with the topics of Ayn Rand , Duke Fraternities and Sororities, Opthamologists I have known, Wit and Wisdom of Ron Paul and Obamacare.

But, I'd still put my money on Maddow. His staff would screw up his Cliff Notes.

Rand Paul-Ted Cruz Rally 2016

 

When Ayn Rand and Friedman bit you in the butt

I knew this was going to happen, as did a lot of us. Theoretically, it was the stuff of public health discussions and philosophy of science and ethics for a long time. First clue that the end was coming was probably when MRSA became a big issue. But, a friend of mine with too much time on his hands Facebook-ed this  earlier today with the note that it was time to start singing the doom song.  Since he's a system administrator for start-ups by profession, he's used to everyone running around saying the world will end tomorrow...in this case, it might.

Another reality is there’s not much money to be made in making new antibiotics, so we saw a lot of drug companies who left the field of antibiotic development because of this combination of factors, that it was getting really hard to discover, to develop new antibiotics, and you don’t make a lot of money in selling these drugs, so the market really wasn’t there. …I can’t tell a patient who has a resistant infection, “If we can get you through this next six months or this next year, there’s going to be a great drug that’s coming.” Or I can’t tell oncologists, for example, “Well, six months from now we’re going to have therapies to offer you; we’re going to have something to combat these infections.”

The drugs aren’t there. And we know it takes a long time to get drugs from the development stage through testing and into the market. Right now, I can’t tell you when you’re going to have a new antibiotic to treat these highly resistant Gram negatives. The best I can say is it’s probably going to be several years, but I can’t point to one that’s in development and say, “We’re going to have that one in three years.”

There is a temptation to be snarky here. "We don't have effective antibiotics? No problem--get some turtle dung, eye of newt and blood of frog and go to town. Maybe some fire...yeah, lots of fire." Unfortunately, this is actually kind of real and is another reason why we should be spending a lot of taxpayer money on developing new therapies. Instead, the Rs are worrying about a bad software site. Bengazi. The fucking national debt that they exploded, TARP that they demanded. Here's the thing -- if we have a succession of plagues caused by diseases we could have treated but now can't, everyone is vulnerable. EVERYONE. The weaker and less healthy will get sick first, but everybody will be at serious risk. This demands a systemic response to which the Ryan-Boehner-Barton-McKeon response will be something along the lines of denial, blaming Obama, scheduling days of prayer and perhaps having Teddy Cruz's dad, the faith-healing Cuban minister (Santeria, anyone?) do some TV faith-healing. After all, it's OK in their minds to swear in to the Congress by TV?

Of course, the Randian-Markets are Magic crowd can indicate the cited interview. After all, this was on PBS, on Frontline. Commie bastards! And the guy in question is a government scientist. Pointy-headed, drone! A damn take wants us to worry...ok, how about the head of R&D from Pfizer, Dr. Charles Knirsch?  The drugs aren't there. They're not even working on them...

Q. But did that mean that you had to close down the antibiotic thing to focus on vaccines? Why couldn’t you do both?

A. Oh, good question. And it’s not a matter of closing down antibiotics. We were having limited success. We had had antibiotics that we would get pretty far along, and a toxicity would emerge either before we even went into human testing or actually in human testing that would lead to discontinuation of those programs. Again, the science was difficult, and we have these other platforms, these vaccine platforms that are state of the art that we think that the prudent allocation of capital addressing very, very important medical need, we would devote the resources to those programs.

Q.  So you decided essentially to shift the capital away from antibiotics and toward vaccine platforms.

A. Yes.

Q. And there were, according to people we’ve talked to, promising compounds at that time. You certainly had what some people described to us as the best and the brightest in the world working on some of these things at Pfizer. But you just said to me that there were problems with them and that there were difficulties, so I just wonder, was this program not the best and the brightest and one of the best in the world?

A. I don’t know which programs you’re referring to. Could you be more specific? Some of these programs right now haven’t even been moved into animal testing.

Now, I want any reader to understand this -- Pfizer is doing this not because they're greedy bastards, or at least, not solely because they are greedy bastards. They're doing because they see antibiotics as a dead end and they need to do something else which is going to require some hard and expensive research, development and clinical trials taking years. They didn't see the "return on innovation," and saw too much risk due to the difficulties of the science involved and the "uncertain regulatory pathways." In other words, things cost too much to do, too much risk of failure and then it just takes time to get a drug through testing, even if it's fast tracked. Should the new antibiotic cause serious side effects that outweigh the benefits, the legal liabilities are incredible. "So, get the divining rod out, Myrtle, we need to find a new well and different magic beans."

I'm honestly not knocking big Pharma so much as capitalism -- the unchecked Capitalism and greed advocated by the Republican Party of the "de-regulate, we're sorry BP, Enron didn't do anything wrong" era. Dr. Krnirsch speaks about public-private partnerships involving government research, universities and what really amounts to cross-fertilization between the various big and small pharmaceutical firms as scientists move between academe, government and business. Frankly, this is one place where the revolving door is not only not a problem for the nation, but where it works to our advantage. But, the fact is that scientific research is part of that "discretionary" funding thing shut down as non-essential during the latest Tea Party led unpleasantness. We're spending a lot less on pure science than we used to, and people like Palin, Cruz, Lee, Bachmann, Demint, Anne Coulter, Hannity and O'Reilly and so on delight in laughing at research studies and the boundary-less nature of what government has funded in the past.

Basic research costs more and more because it's less and less basic, and science is pretty much boundary-less by it's nature. If you are a PhD in biology specializing in primates, you have a deep understanding of math, statistics, chemistry, and some familiarity with physics, earth science and other more esoteric things besides how monkeys work. Basic science and hard science is not something best left to the private sector because the private sector, even the hugely financially successful Pharmaceutical industry, is not designed to take on high risk, low return efforts.

The ideal drug for Pfizer is Viagra, which was initially developed as a tool for hypertension. The physiological effect of lowering blood pressure in the male reproductive organs those allowing better circulation was a side effect that became the reason for the drug's existence. As it came closer and closer to going off patent, Pfizer began to look at it as a mechanism for combating teenage hypertension. In fact, lower doses of the drug are marketed for some types of hypertension but are off patent; the primary money-making purpose for the drug is ED and those patents do not expire until 2019. However, there's nothing to prevent a physician from subscribing the lower dose and less expensive and possibly generic version for ED. They'd just have to prescribe multiple pills...When Canada allowed manufacture of generic Viagra, Pfizer countered by lowering the prices for the real stuff and then appealed saying that the Canadian legal system had erred. As a result, Canada invalidated all the patents on Viagra in Canada.

Scientific and medical research is not about making money; pharmaceutical firms are about making money. As we shift funding for research more to the private sector and less to the public sector, there will be less of the hard science and more of what might be considered technology, which can be described reasonably as the effort to take some scientifically known elements and apply them to resolve engineering problems of one type or another. Writing computer code is an example of a technological use of known scientific processes (coding, math logic, binary math, etc. etc. etc.) some of which is invisible to the writer and can be. But, re-designing the structure of micro-processors to depend on some as yet unknown principle of quantum mechanics or organic as opposed to inorganic chemical compound is science; the basic science lies in discovering that as yet unknown principle or compound.

Business excels at technology because the risk is an engineering solution; not so much at the other aspects of the continuum. The firm answers to the shareholders who may not be willing to absorb the losses of failed experiments trying to turn peanut butter into jet fuel. (That image is homage to Jerry Harvey and the Abilene Paradox, a great explanation for what's going on in Congress and the Republican party. Thank you Dr Harvey for again helping us all understand.) S

o, how do we get the hard science done? Lots of it is done in the great research universities around the world, funded by foundations, Pharma and government. In this country, the only organization that can absorb the cost and the risk of this sort of research -- consider it to be a form of scientific infrastructure -- is the Federal Government. Not funding that risks not having the next great innovation; more to the point, in this incredibly complex organism that is the human community, it risks not being able to respond to the next crisis because no one has even thought of the problem.

The return on investment for a firm in basic science is really limited; the return for the nation on all infrastructure -- intellectual, technological, industrial, transportation, communication -- is incredible largely because the nation is the only one who can afford to do it. To those who worry about burdening future generations with debt, I suggest they consider if the future generations would like to have a future based on eye of newt and fire in hovels and caves connected by goat carts where strep throat and pneumonia kill 50% of the population before age 12, or something marvelous. If it all falls apart, the debt is going to be not an issue; survival will be questionable. We are a community, all in this together; failing to act that way as our right wing compatriots recommend is infuriating, and amusing, and really just an awful idea. The good news is when the universal pandemic  comes, like the black death, plutocrats and senators and their families and supporters will suffer as much if not more than the poor, hungry, weak and those who serve them. However, it's cold comfort -- doing something now seems a far better approach than this when it's too late.  

Some of them were fugitives from a Jackson Brown Song

The class warfare issue: my working theory is that wealthy individuals bought themselves a radical right party, believing — correctly — that it would cut their taxes and remove regulations, but failed to realize that eventually the craziness would take on a life of its own, and that the monster they created would turn on its creators as well as the little people. And nobody knows how it ends. --Paul Krugman

I seldom agree with Congressman Pete King (Republican, County Antrim...err, New York) about much of anything. Certainly, we both have the Irish ability to prevaricate which enables him to see a difference between the Provisional IRA and al Qaeda or Hamas that really doesn't exist. Seriously, Franz Fanon could have written about Falls Road as opposed to Algeria, and same story. So, King's advocacy for gunrunners and money launderers for Green Power while absolute condemnation of anything pro-Palestinian or prop-Arab is interesting. Since I stopped drinking 23 years ago, it's harder for me to do that. I just run out of patience with my own bullshit.

 

Fortunately for the Republicans, John Bohener hasn't quit drinking. So he's able to babble insanely and push a legislative and economic agenda he doesn't believe in for a bunch of clowns he probably despises surrounded by a team he doesn't trust and NOT HAVE HIS HEAD EXPLODE! Fortunate for the Republican party in the short term, but bad for the country and the Republican party in the long run.  But, with Guinness and Bushmills as opposed to Chardonnay comes clarity and Pete King has long since reached the point of cognitive dissonance and his constituents are probably telling him to knock off the crap and get something done. No Republican seat in downstate is a safe seat; to be successful, you have to understand people and compromise and the art of getting things done. So Pete King has a pretty good tether to earth and reality. Louis Gomert and Michelle Bachmann, not so much.  So, he finds himself in something like the position of Lot in Sodom, trying to find a few more just men in the Republican Caucus. Good luck with that: 

“We can’t be going off on these false missions that Ted Cruz wants us to go on,” King continued. “The issues are too important. They’re too serious, they require real conservative solutions, not cheap headline-hunting schemes.” 

If you've been reading my rantings for any period longer than, well, this you know that I am a skeptic about most things but a firm believer that the rich and hyper-rich who are paying attention have pretty consciously been engaging in class warfare for decades. Paul Krugman's and Ezra Klein's analysis is spot on in this case. The question really is how'd we get here...and I suggest listening to  The Talking Head's for the ontological answer. Or, Google the Senate Chaplain's Barry Black's opening prayer yesterday. As Alex Rogers commented at Swampland, Time Magazine's Washington Blog, 

For some, at least, the only thing left to do was pray. “Eternal God, our ever present help in trouble, as our nation stumbles toward a seemingly unavoidable government shutdown, keep our lawmakers from sowing to the wind, thereby risking reaping the whirlwind,” prayed the Senate chaplain Barry C. Black on the floor before the vote. “Remember that all that is necessary for unintended catastrophic consequences is for good people to do nothing.”

 

Well, they certainly didn't do nothing. Rather, they kept doing the same thing, and frankly, it's hard to pick out the most egregious, disingenuous piece of bullshit spewed by the Republican conference. I particularly like the idea that the President wasn't willing to negotiate. WE'RE IN THIS MESS BECAUSE THE PRESIDENT REFUSED TO ACCEPT THAT THE REPUBLICANS IN THE HOUSE AND SENATE WERE INCAPABLE OF NEGOTIATING IN GOOD FAITH.  If you have the patience for it, review the legislative history of the Affordable Care Act and the various budget issues over the last couple of years. I think in Barack Obama we are looking at the second coming not of Abraham Lincoln but of Woodrow Wilson. He's a reasonable man dealing with irrational people who are less interested in doing what's right for the country than in avoiding their "Base's" anger and primary action. Absurd. Wilson's ultimate failure was due to his inability to realize that some people won't see reason; Obama's history is yet to be inscribed, but I suspect that he'll have a similar fate.

I particularly like the R's decision to strip themselves and the Executive's employees of health insurance in supposed solidarity with what the American people are going through...despite the fact that there's a huge difference between the situation of the folks affected by the insurance coverage of the Affordable Care Act and the people who work for the Executive and Congressional Branches of Government. The Affordable Care Act, aka Obamacare, doesn't really have anything to do with the members of Congress or their staff...They Already Have Employer Provided Health Care. This is grandstanding by plutocratic jerks and while nothing will come of it, the staff of the Republicans on the Hill should start sending out resumes now. Just what K-Street needs, more lobbyists.

I'm also enjoying the coverage of the stench of booze on both sides of the aisle; however, it seems like the Dems wait until the bill is actually passed and something is done. (It's also possible that the media is trying to be "fair and balanced" damning both sides. ) Well, now we know...for sure. Wouldn't you love to get a urine sample result from Michelle Bachmann? A breathylizer reading from Boehner?

Clarity in all it's glory...

  Now, certainly there will be peace in our time in the Middle East[/caption] A reader of the Financial Times which I will occasionally read whenever I get a chance particularly if Martin Wolfe is writing that day, provided the world today with the perfect explanation of the Middle East.

A Short Guide to the Middle East

Sir,

Iran is backing Assad.

Gulf states are against Assad!

  Assad is against Muslim Brotherhood.

Muslim Brotherhood and Obama are against General Sisi.

But Gulf states are pro Sisi!

Which means they are against Muslim Brotherhood!

Iran is pro Hamas, but Hamas is backing Muslim Brotherhood!

Obama is backing Muslim Brotherhood, yet Hamas is against the US!

Gulf states are pro US.

But Turkey is with Gulf states against Assad; yet Turkey is pro Muslim Brotherhood against General Sisi.

And General Sisi is being backed by the Gulf states!

Welcome to the Middle East and have a nice day.

Mr KN Al-Sabah, of London, SW1

There, that's all perfectly clear. What could possibly be the problem...

 

 

Sometimes the only question is, did anybody do anything right?

Failure of Leadership with Lots of Unexpected Consequences

I have been relatively quiet on Bradley Manning and Edward Snowden because I am very conflicted about what to think. Like a lot of folks who are reading this, I’ve had the clearance and the access and I remember the oaths I swore and the penalties. A lot of stuff then was pretty silly, but the primary reason for the BURN BEFORE READING stamps was fairly simple – releasing the information would reveal the source. Since I had a kind of obscure specialty for a while, I can recall being dragged out of the Fort Clayton Golf Course Bar by a CW4 who had been one of my students to read traffic that came in as HOTHOTHOT and reading, shaking my head and pointing out the problem. It was pretty funny, the chief went back and bought me another beer and we howled. But, I still can’t talk about more than 20 years later.

Nor would I. Someone got some information they probably should not have had and passed that along to someone else who somehow got it to someone else. The fact that in that chain of someone’s was probably a source just like Bradley Manning or Mr. Snowden is irrelevant. I don’t need to get cheap laughs. However, if you have a SCIF handy, read me back on and I’ll tell you the story.

So, you don’t talk about what you know. I taught at the INTEL School and that’s where I learned my SKIF etiquette but that training started a lot earlier. A boss of mine was reading one of Kissinger’s books where it referenced the clearance that he had, and the boss went ballistic – some things are incredibly sensitive even if you don’t care why. Henry the K didn’t care about a couple of 10000 grunts and a couple of 100000 Vietnamese and Cambodians or so; why would he care about something silly like the name of an access? The boss’ boss came in to talk to us about it, and said that “We are held to a higher standard.” You put on the uniform and you are held to a higher standard.

On the other hand, the stuff that Manning leaked through International Man of Mystery Julian Assange was primarily battle journals. In other words, the old DA 1594s or whatever they are calling them now, some SITREPs, some raw SPOT Reports and so on. He was a computer geek and a very junior Intel Analyst. He plotted stuff on maps. If he had access to a lot of highly classified stuff, that was really stupid.

But, the material is pretty damning. We were in a war that we should not have started, fighting a professionals’ war against the people – with the exception of the Kurds, at one time or another we were fighting everybody while they consistently were and are fighting and killing each other. We don’t get the culture, the religion, the climate the history. We still don’t, but that last time worked out so well that there’s really no reason not to do it again. I just don’t see a statue of Tommy Franks in the future of West Point.

Manning was getting a view of how silly that was, how insane, how brutal and how fruitless. I don’t know what motivated the guy. But, I do know that most of what he revealed was probably vastly over classified. And then we get to another problem, one that I realized last night at dinner with my wife who in her Army incarnation was a Documents Custodian in a Brigade S2 in Europe.  The coin dropped; she worked as a civilian for DOD and DOT and I had been a contractor. Guess what – no way if any current security procedures were being adhered to could Manning have gotten the stuff he had to Wikileaks. We’re not discussing a highly trained intelligence operative here, we’re talking about a pretty flakey private in a combat zone., who appears to have been violating every principle of handling sensitive and classified material in the book; according to Wikipedia he told one of his biographers that he smuggled the stuff out on his data card.

When the coin dropped, I dropped my sandwich. My wife at best tolerates my jousting with windmills, but this one bugged her as much as it bothers me. This should not have happened. And it did – and it was not Manning who was the weak spot, but the supervision and leadership that let him do whatever misguided and deranged crap he did.

Manning was on a secure DOD/ Army system, in a sensitive compartmentalized intelligence facility (SCIF) of some sort and he was able to download highly classified materials to either thumb drives, data cards or CDs. The military banned all that stuff on its computers prior to the kid's enlistment. While it might be possible to cheat if you were on night shift in a CP someplace with just a normal Army computer and nobody checking on you, in a SCIF there are a lot of people checking on you usually. When you enter the SCIF, you are subject to search; brief cases, backpacks and similar things are checked as a matter of course. HOW THE HELL DID HE BREACH THE BASIC IT SECURITY AND THE PHYSICAL SECURITY PROTECTING THIS STUFF? This is a serious concern. Certainly, the officers and NCOs running the place should be investigated for either complicity or negligence or both. If they say him with a CD, they needed to act immediately; if they saw him with a data stick, ditto. Slipping a micro into a slot would be really disturbing. Either they didn’t care, they allowed it to happen or they just didn’t bother to watch this obvious candidate for Soldier of the Millenniums. Somewhere, SGT Morales is crying.

The fact that somehow this kid had access to TS and higher should bother a lot of us. Did DOD not investigate the guy prior to the granting of the clearance? Was there no interview? How did he keep the clearance after reprimands? WHO GETS REPRIMANDED FOR ASSAULTING AN OFFICER? Maybe some hard corps grunt dealing with the problems of cooling down after a fraught mission and being asked some silly crap; but, this guy was a REMF. There's a lot to be concerned about here, but Manning's actual leaks are the least of it. He was a computer GEEK and gee, the Army needs those for places like Fort Meade and various Field Stations. Was he in a Field Station? No, he was in the SCIF in a Forward Operating Base in Iraq. The Army knew he needed help; they were going to discharge him during Basic for unsuitability. Instead of washing him out, they sent him on to AIT and he got a TS/SCI clearance. The unit wanted to leave him behind instead of taking him to Iraq but they were short analysts so...  Where the hell were the Counter-Intelligence people who were supposed to be there? He was acting out all over the place in all sorts of ways…and nobody noticed until a hacker reported him? Seriously.  In a combat zone, prior to the repeal of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell, the guy was openly gay, disrespectful and out of line.

Now, many years ago there was an Army Security Agency analyst we’ll call Randy. Randy was at Field Station Augsburg and was very, very gay. Openly gay. Blatantly gay. He cross-dressed and hung around the Bahnhof according one guy who knew him. Nobody cared, he was really good at his job. The MI community was always very tolerant of a lot of deviance, up to a point. One story had the Politzei catching him at the Bahnhof along with the MP liaisons and there he went. How do I know the story is true? One of my officer students at the INTEL school told me about him; then others told me about him; and then, when I was facilitating course with the Warrants and the subject of stress and reactions to it was on the table, one of the Warrants started saying that none of that was problem in the old ASA, none of their soldiers had issues and this was a waste of everyone’s time to consider. “Chief,” I asked, “Were you ever in Augsburg?” “Yeah, Sarge, I spent most of my enlisted in Augsburg.” “Chief, did you ever know a guy named Randy?” Silence…followed by laughter. “Oh hell, Sarge, Randy was my squad leader…” “Were the stories true?” “Oh Shit! You had to be there…”

So, yeah, Manning is guilty of a lot of stuff. However, given the obvious questions and the way the guy was treated while awaiting trial -- Marine Stockade as opposed to Army Stockade? Solitary confinement because he was suicidal? Naked? -- make me think that justice could be best served in his case by sentencing him to reduction to E-1, a Less than Honorable Discharge, and a couple of years in Leavenworth. I'd actually prefer the reduction, a General Discharge under Honorable Conditions and time served. 

And then, the Army needs to start asking some hard questions about what the hell happened to common sense and adherence to basic procedures safeguarding materials. Manning's Chain of Command needs desperately to have a bunch of their careers ended so they can move on to their true calling of asking if you want paper or plastic. If they'd been doing their jobs, this wouldn't have happened. Everything about Iraq that went bad, down to the way we found out a lot about it was due to a failure of leadership at a really existential level.

I’d also like to turn to the helicopter footage that has gotten so much attention. Why would that have been TOP SECRET? I wonder why it would have been more than CONFIDENTIAL – where was the serious harm to the nation in that footage? It was sad, tragic, reflected poorly on the rules of engagement and all the nonsense we’ve been told about how carefully precise everything is on the digital battlefield. It’s not, and we know. Reuters knew the stuff existed and asked for the material. They submitted a Freedom of Information Act request and were rebuffed. The FOIA request should have been granted, with some redaction, and then de-classified.

Soldiers in combat cause collateral damage. Soldiers in combat do a lot of things to block the horror. We know that. But, the American people need to know that. They need to have their noses rubbed in it so every time some yahoo decides to start demanding we go off to some war some goddamned place, there are no surprises. Bradley Manning broke the law, broke his oath as a soldier and did it irresponsibly and almost blithely. No Luther-Ellsberg existential “Here I am, I can do no other…”anguish there. But, he needed help, guidance and the attention that soldiers, especially weak soldiers need and deserve all the time, not just in combat.

I had soldiers like Manning. Any NCO or Officer who led troops had to deal with people like Manning. Too smart for their MOS, too smart for their duties, not fitting in, not a lean mean fighting machine – just a kid who needed his ass kicked and his shoulder patted. Instead, he was ignored, not mentored, not helped and this is what happened. I had 200 soldiers in my last company, and I knew all the flakes and made a point of watching them. I didn’t bully them, I didn’t berate them, and I sought ways to help them grow and adapt. I know my last company was at Fort Lewis and this was in Combat. I don’t care; the way you operate in garrison is the same way you need to operate in the field. If you take care of you soldiers, they’ll amaze you when the chips are down. If you don’t, well, this is what happens.

Manning appears to have had other problems. He lived an openly gay life prior to enlisting in the Army. While If you can salvage a marginal soldier, you might create a superstar. But if you can’t, and it appears his chain of command had figured out he wasn’t going to hack it, you don’t take them Iraq, you don’t cut them slack for acting crazy, you don’t look the other way. You get them out of combat, away from the unit and let the psychiatrists and JAG determine what needs to happen next. YOU DON”T SHOVE THEM IN A POORLY SUPERVISED SKIF for fifteen hours a day. But, “ Farrell, we were short analysts in the worst way”. To which I can only respond, “Yeah, and look what that kind of short term thinking got you.”

 

 

 

 

 

Over the hills and far away, a rogue's lament...

 

 ___________________________________________________________________________________ I received this note this morning from the only general I’m on a First Name basis with – I call him General or Boss and he calls me Mike. Anyway, I’ve written about Larry Lust before, but I think this note from him was pretty apropos of what we’re facing as the soldiers come home from this debacle…

Ladies and Gentlemen, 

Should you ever wondered what valor looks like, go to the website below and watch the video of MGS Roy Benavidez's remarkable story. 

http://www.greatamericans.com/video/Portraits-of-Valor-Roy-Benavide

 V/r, LJL

Larry J. Lust Major General, USA, Retired 

_______________________________________________________________________________________________________ If you’re not familiar with Master Sergeant Roy P. Benavidez, read the following citation… The President of the United States of America, authorized by Act of Congress, March 3, 1863 has awarded in the name of the Congress the Medal of Honor to: MASTER SERGEANT ROY P. BENAVIDEZ UNITED STATES ARMY for conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity in action at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty West of Loc Ninh on 2 May 1968:

Citation: Master Sergeant, then Staff Sergeant, United States Army. Who distinguished himself by a series of daring and extremely glorious actions on 2 May 1968 while assigned to Detachment B-56, 5th Special Forces Group (Airborne). 1st Special Forces, Republic of Vietnam. On the morning of 2 May 1968, a 12-man Special Forces Reconnaissance Team was inserted by helicopters in a dense jungle area west of Loc Ninh, Vietnam to gather intelligence information about confirmed large-scale enemy activity. This area was controlled and routinely patrolled by the North Vietnamese Army. After a short period of time on the ground, the team met heavy enemy resistance and requested emergency extraction. 3 helicopters attempted extraction, but were unable to land due to intense enemy small arms and anti-aircraft fire. Sergeant Benavidez was at the Forward Operating Base in Loc Ninh monitoring the operation by radio when these helicopters returned to off-load wounded crew members and to assess aircraft damage. Sergeant Benavidez voluntarily boarded a returning aircraft to assist in another extraction attempt. Realizing that all the team members were either dead or wounded and unable to move to the pickup zone, he directed the aircraft to a nearby clearing where he jumped from the hovering helicopter, and ran approximately 75 meters under withering small arms fire to the crippled team. Prior to reaching the team's position he was wounded in his right leg, face and head. Despite these painful injuries he took charge, repositioning the team members and directing their fire to facilitate the landing of an extraction aircraft, and the loading of wounded and dead team members. He then threw smoke canisters to direct the aircraft to the team's position. Despite his severe wounds and under intense enemy fire, he carried and dragged half of the wounded team members to the awaiting aircraft. He then provided protective fire by running alongside the aircraft as it moved to pick up the remaining team members. As the enemy's fire intensified, he hurried to recover the body and classified documents on the dead team leader. When he reached the leader's body, Sergeant Benavidez was severely wounded by small arms fire in the abdomen and grenade fragments in his back. At nearly the same moment, the aircraft pilot was mortally wounded, and his helicopter crashed. Although in extremely critical condition due to his multiple wounds, Sergeant Benavidez secured the classified documents and made his way back to the wreckage, where he aided the wounded out of the overturned aircraft, and gathered the stunned survivors into a defensive perimeter. Under increasing enemy automatic weapons and grenade fire, he moved around the perimeter distributing water and ammunition to his weary men, reinstilling in them a will to live and fight. Facing a buildup of enemy opposition with a beleaguered team, Sergeant Benavidez mustered his strength, began calling in tactical air strikes and directed the fire from supporting gun ships to suppress the enemy's fire and so permit another extraction attempt. He was wounded again in his thigh by small arms fire while administering first aid to a wounded team member just before another extraction helicopter was able to land. His indomitable spirit kept him going as he began to ferry his comrades to the craft. On his second trip with the wounded, he was clubbed with additional wounds to his head and arms before killing his adversary. He then continued under devastating fire to carry the wounded to the helicopter. Upon reaching the aircraft, he spotted and killed 2 enemy soldiers who were rushing the craft from an angle that prevented the aircraft door gunner from firing upon them. With little strength remaining, he made one last trip to the perimeter to ensure that all classified material had been collected or destroyed, and to bring in the remaining wounded. Only then, in extremely serious condition from numerous wounds and loss of blood, did he allow himself to be pulled into the extraction aircraft. Sergeant Benavidez' gallant choice to voluntarily join his comrades who were in critical straits, to expose himself constantly to withering enemy fire, and his refusal to be stopped despite numerous severe wounds, saved the lives of at least 8 men. His fearless personal leadership, tenacious devotion to duty, and extremely valorous actions in the face of overwhelming odds were in keeping with the highest traditions of the military service, and reflect the utmost credit on him and the United States Army.

Famously, when the Medics got to Benavidez at Loc Ninh, they took one look at the hunk of hamburger that remained of the guy, and started to put him in a body bag. Conscious but unable to move or speak, he let them know he was still alive by spitting blood at them. Interesting to think of Benavidez this week. A lieutenant I served with from South Texas when I was in exile from the active duty to the reserves back in the days of "Capstone" knew the guy when he'd been in JROTC. Quiet man, friendly, and serious PTSD. Well, duh...but, quiet, friendly and interested in talking to young people about their future. Like fajitas, Pearl Beer and Norteno music. Loved his country, family and home town.

There is something incredible about these men, and I suspect sooner than we might think, women. They didn't get up that morning to be heroes. They didn't wrap themselves in the flag and run around proclaiming themselves to be something great. They found themselves in a situation, they did their duty because that was what they figured they were supposed to do, and then are universally pretty humble about the whole thing.

This is an excellent time to watch the old Audie Murphy "To Hell and Back." (My first day as First Sergeant of the 9th Chemical Company, 9ID (Motorized) I spent on that airfield parade strip at the end of the film followed by a division run...Hooah...first one led by MG Taylor after MG Shallikashivilli gave up command. ) And, I was miserable all over the terrain shown in that film at Lewis). Guy wanted to take care of his family, protect his buddies, do his job, maybe get an education and serve his country. While his performance in The Red Badge of Courage was classic, TH&B presented the GI as GI. His life was tragic in a lot of ways, but Murphy remained humble about his service and loved nothing more than to be with soldiers. Not bragging or dominating, although those stars tend to do it when you’re around on of these guys, but just to BS and listen. Murphy was awarded the Medal as the result of an incident where he stopped a German Tank with Infantry  attack, firing the M2 from the deck of a burning Tank Destroyer after calling in Artillery fire directly on his position. When the FSE asked him how close the enemy was to him, he said, “Hold on a second and I’ll let you talk to them…” It’s worth revisiting Murphy’s citation as well.

CITATION: On January 26th, 1945 2ND Lt. Murphy commanded Company B, which was attacked by 6 tanks and waves of infantry. 2ND Lt. Murphy ordered his men to withdraw to prepared positions in a woods, while he remained forward at his command post and continued to give fire directions to the artillery by telephone. Behind him, to his right, 1 of our tank destroyers received a direct hit and began to burn. Its crew withdrew to the woods. 2ND Lt. Murphy continued to direct artillery fire which killed large numbers of the advancing enemy infantry. With the enemy tanks abreast of his position, 2ND Lt. Murphy climbed on the burning tank destroyer, which was in danger of blowing up at any moment, and employed its .50 caliber machine gun against the enemy. He was alone and exposed to German fire from 3 sides, but his deadly fire killed dozens of Germans and caused their infantry attack to waver. The enemy tanks, losing infantry support, began to fall back. For an hour the Germans tried every available weapon to eliminate 2ND Lt. Murphy, but he continued to hold his position and wiped out a squad which was trying to creep up unnoticed on his right flank. Germans reached as close as 10 yards, only to be mowed down by his fire. He received a leg wound, but ignored it and continued the single-handed fight until his ammunition was exhausted. He then made his way to his company, refused medical attention, and organized the company in a counterattack which forced the Germans to withdraw. His directing of artillery fire wiped out many of the enemy; he killed or wounded about 50. 2ND Lt. Murphy's indomitable courage and his refusal to give an inch of ground saved his company from possible encirclement and destruction, and enabled it to hold the woods which had been the enemy's objective. 

I was out at Fort Irwin earlier this week. NTC is at its usual delightful summer weather, 110+ and dry as a bone, with a light 20 knot wind. Because of the Sequester, they'd cancelled a number of rotations at the National Training Center and cut back on civilian services, so when I got to the gate, MPs were manning it. Not a lot of traffic, so I struck up a conversation with the soldiers. Turns out that after all that time in the desert in Iraq and Afghanistan, the installation decided to not provide any way to cool the water for these guys. They see the commander of the relief about every four hours, and have him bring out ice that they buy themselves. For some reason, this got me mad...kids asked me not to mention their names and assured me that "Hey, First Sergeant, we can take care of ourselves..." Told them that I knew that we'd always had to do that because nobody else would but that didn't make it right.

Since my congressman is that troll who heads the house defense committee, Buck McKeon, I'll send him a note. Not that it will do anything, since the Specialists and PFCs of the garrison MPs don't contribute to his campaign, but in between sending me emails about how he's fighting for jobs by passing anti-abortion legislation and has our soldiers backs by supporting more money for contractors, I'll appeal to his conscience. That should be interesting. 

 

As for me, I’ll drop a note to the garrison CSM which is more likely to accomplish something. And, make a point of checking to see if they need any ice or anything when I drive through the gate for a visit to drop off when I head back to Barstow. If we all did stuff like that, all of those of us who wake up every day and wish we could put on the uniforms again and go mess around with soldiers, I wonder what the impact would be? 

When I got to wear a uniform every day, I was intimately invested in the lives and futures of the 200 or so soldiers in my company. My soldiers. Well, now they are all my soldiers. They are now all your soldiers. We need to take care of them, their families, their dreams, and aspirations. But, at the very least, we should be able to make certain that they have cool water to drink occupying a freaking guard post in the Mojave Desert in June. 

I admit I’m assuming the best case – the McCaines and Grahames will fail and we won’t end up neck deep in a Shiite-Sunni war of mutual annihilation in the Middle East. Of course, we’re not masters of our fate on that…events have a way of steamrolling us.  We'll get our soldiers home finally, and they'll be pretty quickly forgotten. And we'll have soldiers doing their duty, taking care of their brothers and sisters by pooling money to buy ice and space heaters and who knows what else, and the nation will forget. I've quoted Kipling more than once at the blogs I write for...probably time to do so again...

 

Speaking of the Sequester, I was walking from the grocery store this afternoon in the blazing Barstow sun in 113 degree temperatures. Guy in his 30s approached me with a bottle of Windex and asked me to let him wash my windshield for spare change. He told me he had just been laid off without any notice at Fort Irwin’s Nonappropriated Fund Program at the Shock Zone of something. The haircut still gives me away, but I have no idea what that might. If you find yourself at Irwin, be assured they have a shock zone. The guy had no understanding of why he was laid off, just that he needed to make some money to keep his family fed. I gave him some cash, and wished him luck. Wasn’t a lot of cash, but he was grateful and asked if I’d let him wash my car windows. Shit. I told him to skip it, and wished him luck again; he asked God to bless me.

 

Now, if you’ve been looking at my stuff, you know that doesn’t have much impact on me. I’m the guy who says sincerely that if there is a god, she and I have some issues to work out.  But it got me thinking; I have no reason to be alive, semi-prosperous, pretty healthy and comfortable. I’ve done enough stupid stuff that I should be dead. In jail perhaps; in an insane asylum. Yet, here I am. I don’t believe in god, but life has been pretty good to me. Now, if life would get me out of Barstow that would be helpful. Regardless, however, the reason this guy is now begging for scraps right now is the Sequester. I really don’t feel badly that the executives at the defense contractors won’t get the same bonuses they would get if they got bigger new contracts. In fact, I think most of them probably should be in jail along with the bankers, bond traders, rating agencies and hedge fund managers. From whom much is given, much is owed and much is expected. Haven’t quite lived up to that in American business for a while. But, damn it, the Sequester is hurting people who aren’t concerned about how they’ll get by if Mercedes stops making Maybachs or if they can pay for another dancing horse. It’s hurting those soldiers trying to drink hot water to stay hydrated in 110 heat at Fort Irwin. It’s hurting this guy, Pedro F. Rodriguez, who is just trying not to be a bum in Barstow. It’s hurting our present, it’s hurting our future, and it’s betraying our past.  It’s our time. There’s nobody else here; just us. If it’s going to be right, it’s our time to make it right. I have little trust in the good intentions of most of the elected officials in this country. But, they do care about their jobs. Their money. Their pensions. Their perks. We can take that away from them. We need to serve them notice that until every American who wants a job can have one based on their skills, abilities and dreams; that until every American has adequate housing, food and medical care; that until every child in this country goes to bed full, healthy, with clothes and supplies for schools; when everyone has some reasonable level of safety, security and hope, that the elected classes and the 1% for and by  whom they largely seem to be employed are at risk of a radically less lucrative future. Otherwise, we join the betrayal -- of present, past, future and any concept of the United States as the last best hope for mankind. 

 

Mighty long way down a dusty road all the way to the abyss...

The Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan largely because they were totally frustrated with their client state's inability to do just about anything that they expected them to do. The people of the former Soviet Union are still suffering the impact of that decision. Russia is still engaged in the continuing kerfluffle in the Caucasus but that at least seems consistent. Chechnya is a small scale version of Afghanistan but Russia has all the cards; we're not arming the Chechens, and the various Islamic cash cows have avoided providing a lot of support beyond prayer and some limited humanitarian. Part of that has to do with the global war on terror's chilling effect on dissident elements in various Islamic nations; part of it has to do with the fact that the Chechens have proven themselves to be basically threats to anybody they don't like very much.

 

One would have thought that after the almost 12 years of war in Afghanistan with the ongoing unmentioned conflicts in Somalia and Yemen and watching the emerging religious cleansing in Iraq, that we'd have learned to not get involved in another Islamic intramural cluster in Western Asia. The old saw about not getting involved in a land war in Asia really is about the continent of Asia, not just the parts we've already had our asses kicked in. Like it or not, global power projectors, none of our land wars in Asia have turned out well. At best, we've had a draw in Korea lasting almost as long as I've been alive; I guess the Boxer Rebellion turned out ok, and of course, there was Vietnam...But now the US has decided that the Syrian government has crossed a red line and used chemical agents. This horrible crime against humanity that supposedly killed about 200 people in multiple attacks will not stand. (Give me a squad,  some .50 cal sniper rifles, Mk19 Automatic grenade launchers, some mortars, some M2 machineguns, a lot of bullets and maybe some close air support -- all of which the Syrians have or at least have the equivalents--and we'll deliver a helluva lot more than 200 casualties if you give us a village or six to take out, if we were the types of guys who slaughter civilians. The Syrian Army doesn't have that squeamish ethical reserve that we have. 

 

 McCain and Co. are all in on doing more in Syria and have been for a long time. In fact, the White House let him know that they had decided to start arming the rebels and he went on the Senate floor before the either the President or the White House could make the announcement to complain that the offer of aid was obviously insufficient and we need a no-fly zone and a CAP. Hard for me to see much of an up side, given that once again, they're all evil bastards and whatever we do will turn out wrong. On one side, we have the Assad regime which is a totally awful bunch of psychopaths assisted by Hezbollah another total bunch of psychopaths and funded by the Iranians whose government is almost but not quite in the North Korean government mode of batshit insane. Yeah, anything might be better -- until we look at the rebels, who are a hodgepodge of factions and elements who are opposed to the Assad control because of tyranny and evil and...oh yeah, the Assad family is Alawite, a Shiite sect that is a minority in Syria but seized power back in the day as part of the Baathist movement under this Assad's dad. If you recall the Sadr clan in Iraq fondly, then you'll love the rebels because they represent the mirror image of the Shiites in Iraq. In Syria, the Sunnis are the majority and they've been jerked around unconscionably by the Shiites under the Assad family. So, there are people who are opposed to the regime because the regime is bad and they want to do better; and, there are people who just want to kill the Alawites.

 

I've been out of the Army for 16 years and seldom worked in my original MOS during it. However, I remained really good at the technical aspects of it, and was in fact distinguished graduate of my advanced course where we focused largely on the technical stuff. I was an expert on Chemical, Biological and Chemical weapons. We did a lot of experimentation with chemical weapons in places like Toole and Dugway, and we have a really good idea of how the lousy things work. So, the news that the Syrians have chemical weapons wasn't surprising to me bu the news that they had used them was pretty surprising, and the way that they've been employed is really weird. They appear to have used them in isolated attacks against small targets with very light casualties resulting. I'd like to know more, just from a student of stupid ways to fight bad guys point of view. The news that they have managed to inflict 150-200 casualties in a war that has killed 93000 people so far with Saran Nerve Agent is absolutely dumbfounding. If some dipshit told me he  could take out 200 people in a single attack with nerve agent, I'd refuse to waste the rounds. That simple -- the casualties aren't worth the effort of issuing and safeguarding the munitions or of the bad press resulting in the US now announcing it will arm the rebels while John Napoleon McCain demands we do more. You terrify the rebels, maybe; but you really piss off the Israelis and the Turks and Europe and we've got that red line rhetoric hanging out there. Assad may be a lousy dentist and sit at the head of a politic0-criminal gang of thugs, thieves, torturers and sociopaths; but, he is not stupid. Pissing on the US is just not a great idea because, well, we've been feeling testy lately.

Iranian Soldiers in Iraq-Iranian war in Chemical Protective equipment.

So, who'd be dumb enough to do this? I am not an advocate of everything that happens has a false flag aspect, but I'm pretty open to the idea in this case. The use of the weapon really makes no sense. But, for Israel or Iraq or the Rebels, it makes a lot of sense. There is another possibility, that these numbers are based on the number of people who had their blood tested and showed some sign of a lack of acetyl-cholinesterase, the cause of casualty with nerve agents. There have been multiple attacks and 200 deaths is just not something worth doing; but, 20000 might be worth it. The Islamic reqirement to get bodies buried as soon as possible really works against any scenario of heaps of dead bodies to check; if I wanted to mazimize casualties, I'd have used a persistent agent, VR55 or VX. You have something like motor oil hanging around and in the case of VR55 actually producing significant amounts of vapor casualties as well as contact casualties for anyone who gets a drop on bare skin. There's no upside in a war like this to using an aerosol agent unless you're just using it stupidly out of sheer anally fixated evil stupidity. Which is certainly possible, given the nature of the players in this snake rodeo.

The geo-political aspect of this are pretty obvious -- we need to do something different than rush into the Syrian goat rodeo with all the gusto of a starving middle linebacker going to an all you can eat ribs dinner. My thought is that we take the old Churchillian description of the area as correct, a collection of tribes with flags, and act accordingly. In this case, we need to be very careful about strategic interests of ourselves and our allies. And we need to be very conscious of what looks like a resurgence of the Islamic civil war between Shi'ia and Sunni. There is a belt of Shiite power running from Iran through Iraq to Syria; in Syria, however the balance of population shifts from predominantly Shiite to predominately Sunni. Long range goal for a peaceful solution would probably involve a people and land swap; that probably won't happen, but if the Sunni in Iraq were to move to Syria and the Alawites from Syria to Iraq, then the problem of minority majority would be eliminated. 

I'm not sure who is most deserving of aid here -- probably Turkey, Jordan and Lebanon for having to deal with the refugee problem. It would be interesting to have the new Sunni state of Syria declared a demilitarized zone under UN protection, but that probably can't happen. And, I suspect the Iraqi Sunni and the Syrian Sunni would have plenty of conflict; the Alawites and the more traditional Shiites of Iraq and Iran would probably have issues. Probably just degenerate into constant civil war regardless of what we do. 

Ireland found some peace after 800 years, but largely because both sides were stuck with an outside mediator they had to trust and to whom they had ties. More importantly, the people of Ireland, especially in Ulster, were sick of fighting, the British were sick of fighting and the people -- the sea in which the IRA and the Orange paramilitaries swam to steal an allusion from cousin Mao -- were desperate for an alternative. In the great clash of Islamic sects, the people respond to the demagogues and the demagogues are even warmed up yet. So, we need to assist Turkey and probably Jordan, and actively quarantine this area of conflict. That would be our strategic interest. I suspect we won't do that, but the idea of US forces, even if primarily Air and perhaps Naval getting involved with a proxy war with Iran -- because of the Shi'ia versus Sunni thing, the financial and weapons support of Iran and the involvement of Hezbollah -- is just not a good idea. 

Or, we can get involved in another land war in Asia. It worked so well the last time...After all, if you've done something multiple times with lousy results, doing it again has got to be a good idea. 

 

A strange place full of dragons

Go tell the Spartans, passerby:
That here, by Spartan law, we lie  -Herodotus

Also obedience in its highest form is not obedience to a constant and compulsory law, but a persuaded or voluntary yielded obedience to an issued command .... His name who leads the armies of Heaven is "Faithful and True"... and all deeds which are done in alliance with these armies ... are essentially deeds of faith, which therefore ... is at once the source and the substance of all known deed, rightly so called ... as set forth in the last word of the noblest group of words ever, so far as I know, uttered by simple man concerning his practice, being the final testimony of the leaders of a great practical nation:

 "Ō ksein', angellein Lakedaimoniois hoti tēidekeimetha, tois keinōn rhēmasi peithomenoi." -- John Rushin 

Going through email and stuff this morning, I was looking at something on Linked In and instead of clicking through, I decided to read the link. It takes you to an article in an Australian Business News Journal, and frankly, I'm trying to figure out why we haven't seen it before. Recounting a speech by Lieutenant General John Kelly concerning the valor of two Marines, it should have received national attention at the time -- the attack, their valor and Kelly's speech should be shouted from a lot of podiums. Damn few heroes decide to be heroes -- they do their jobs and do what they have to do.  In some ways, Kelly's speech was an example of that sort of heroism -- the speech was given just four days after his son, Lieutenant Robert Kelly, USMC was killed in action. Kelly doesn't mention his son--the two young men he chose to highlight represent all who serve.

Corporal Jonathan Yale and Lance Corporal Jordan Haerter

Two Marines from separate battalions, a Corporal and a Lance Corporal, are assigned to guard a checkpoint. Kelly describes it as only someone who's not only got the t-shirt but washed, ironed and starched it can:

The mission orders they received from the sergeant squad leader I am sure went something like: “OK you two clowns, stand this post and let no unauthorised personnel or vehicles pass.” “You clear?” I am also sure Yale and Haerter then rolled their eyes and said in unison something like: “Yes Sergeant,” with just enough attitude that made the point without saying the words, “No kidding sweetheart, we know what we’re doing.” They then relieved two other Marines on watch and took up their post at the entry control point of Joint Security Station Nasser, in the Sophia section of Ramadi, al Anbar, Iraq.

A few minutes later a large blue truck turned down the alley way—perhaps 60-70yards in length—and sped its way through the serpentine of concrete jersey walls. The truck stopped just short of where the two were posted and detonated, killing them both catastrophically. 20-four brick masonry houses were damaged or destroyed. A mosque 100 yards away collapsed. The truck’s engine came to rest two hundred yards away knocking most of a house down before it stopped.

Our explosive experts reckoned the blast was made of 2,000 pounds of explosives. Two died, and because these two young infantrymen didn’t have it in their DNA to run from danger, they saved 150 of their Iraqi and American brothers-in-arms.

Now, to be clear, this kind of thing happens all around the world, everywhere American soldiers, sailors, Marines, Air Men and Coast Guardsman are stationed. Anybody else recall "I will guard everything within the limits of my post and quit my post only when properly relieved"? But, this is what that statement means -- everywhere, these young women and men are there, maybe not conscious of it, prepared to do the same thing. The vast, vast majority of us are not called to any sacrifice beyond inconvenience and loss of sleep. But, the reality is that the world is a strange place, full of dragons, and something we must be prepared to respond to.

Kelly was the US and Iraqi Force commander at the time: CINCWORLD, Iraqi Time. When he read the SITREP, he was struck by something that just didn't seem right. He began to dig a bit, calling the Regimental Commander to see what was the real story. The Regimental Commander agreed that there was more happening here than it seemed -- this is the sort of story that probably didn't even register on the national media radar. I can understand why it didn't...Jarheads and Doggies and Swabbies and Zoomies getting killed in Iraq was soooo 2004. Our national attention deficit disorder is both cause and effect of the problem -- and the national media is the victim as well as perpetrator. One of the reasons people became focused on the Vietnam was was that people in the field kept reporting it. The Military has learned how to control journalists now. Anyway, I suspect that it didn't make the President's Daily Intelligence briefing on April 22, 2008 although, given what we know about President Bush's briefing habits, he wouldn't have understood it anyway.

Kelly decided to take a look on the ground and discovered that there were no US witnesses, just Iraqi Forces who had also been there, all of whom survived. He spoke with several of these guys, and they described a bit of exceptional heroism --

I traveled to Ramadi the next day and spoke individually to a half-dozen Iraqi police all of whom told the same story. The blue truck turned down into the alley and immediately sped up as it made its way through the serpentine. They all said, “We knew immediately what was going on as soon as the two Marines began firing.” The Iraqi police then related that some of them also fired, and then to a man, ran for safety just prior to the explosion.

All survived. Many were injured … some seriously. One of the Iraqis elaborated and with tears welling up said, “They’d run like any normal man would to save his life.”

What he didn’t know until then, he said, and what he learned that very instant, was that Marines are not normal. Choking past the emotion he said, “Sir, in the name of God no sane man would have stood there and done what they did.”

“No sane man.”

“They saved us all.”

Acts of exceptional valor and heroism aren't acts of sane men and women. They are acts of exceptional human beings and again, we are all called to that standard when we raise our hands  repeating the oath at enlistment or at commissioning. Interestingly, after he had written the summary and recommended then for the award of the Navy Cross, Kelly learned that one of the security cameras caught the entire thing. Here's the meat of his description

It happened exactly as the Iraqis had described it. It took exactly six seconds from when the truck entered the alley until it detonated...You can watch the last six seconds of their young lives. Putting myself in their heads I supposed it took about a second for the two Marines to separately come to the same conclusion about what was going on once the truck came into their view at the far end of the alley. Exactly no time to talk it over, or call the sergeant to ask what they should do. Only enough time to take half an instant and think about what the sergeant told them to do only a few minutes before: “… let no unauthorised personnel or vehicles pass.”...

The recording shows the truck careening to a stop immediately in front of the two Marines. In all of the instantaneous violence Yale and Haerter never hesitated. By all reports and by the recording, they never stepped back. They never even started to step aside. They never even shifted their weight. With their feet spread should width apart, they leaned into the danger, firing as fast as they could work their weapons. They had only one second left to live.

The truck explodes. The camera goes blank. Two young men go to their God. Six seconds. Not enough time to think about their families, their country, their flag, or about their lives or their deaths, but more than enough time for two very brave young men to do their duty…into eternity. That is the kind of people who are on watch all over the world tonight—for you.

What makes this piece particularly hard for me to read and respond to is simple: No act of valor or sacrifice is meaningless. But, to waste that act and sacrifice is to profane something sacred, to piss on the courage, honor, integrity and dedication of those who performed heroically. The greedy and power mad assisted by the the ignorant and the fools who got us into Iraq are beating the drums and ring those bells and shooting those pistols to paraphrase their patroness, St Sarah of Wasilla with the goal of getting us into another one. Now, at least McCain and Graham served, and Palin's on also served. But, the vast majority of the opinion makers and political powers have no idea  about what this means. Two Marines died; four sailors drowned; a plane went into a mountain side flying air support; a patrol of soldiers was hit by motors and wiped out. Ah, well, it's time to go ride the mountain bike, shoot some hoops, and  and complain about the Democrats, the Congress, the Media. Who cares about these guys? That's what they signed up for.

So all honor to the fallen; for the rest of us, we have a solemn duty to make certain it doesn't happen again without a lot of foot stamping, shouting and flag waiving by those of us who have earned the right, at least in part to do so. Those who have paid the full price for that right are no longer able to speak, but they depend on us to act for them.

 

Deep Treason by shallow minds...

Speaker Boehner has had the privilege, which he screwed up both times, of swearing in the members of the House of Representatives. In that oath, they swear to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies and then engage in a ceremonial reading of the Constitution  which they have screwed up both times. What I'm missing is how a party that crows so much about patriotism and country can then turn around and do everything they can to undermine the Constitution and the government that is the instrument of upholding and enforcing it?

 The 14th Amendment primarily is the guarantee of due process to all citizens and has language that may confer the same guarantees on all persons under the jurisdiction of the United States or the various states. But, Section 4 is even more clear --

Section 4. The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of pensions and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection or rebellion, shall not be questioned. But neither the United States nor any State shall assume or pay any debt or obligation incurred in aid of insurrection or rebellion against the United States, or any claim for the loss or emancipation of any slave; but all such debts, obligations and claims shall be held illegal and void.

The first sentence says it all. The United States pays its bills, and does nothing to call that public debt into question; rather, it does everything to pay the debt as it is accrued and comes due. So the news that Boehner and the Boys(and Girls) of the Republican Party are planning on a new way to pay the debt using some sort of magic bill doesn't strike me so much as absurd, stupid or asinine -- although it's all three and any other negative adjective you'd like -- but is in fact a violation of the Amendment.

By voting for it, I believe they have engaged in a conspiracy to undermine the United States government and violate the Constitution. The fact that so many of the Republicans in the House voted for this abomination should scare anyone with a bit of sense. If you begin to stake out the debate by establishing the pattern of taking your marbles and going home, it gets to be difficult for the other side to take you seriously. And, if you response to a systemic problem is to dance around like capering apes, well, it gets even more difficult to stand to be around you. Frankly, neither Boehner nor McConnell have shown any tendency to keep their words, promises or principles. They don't want to lose their jobs -- which is interesting, since I would think that passing out campaign money and other bribes...err, gratuities...no, bribes in the name of whomever is paying them would be right in their G-spot. Together, they could be the Dancing Queens of the K-Street Crowd.

 

Ok, the bill violates the Constitution  It also has no chance of passing the Senate, and if it somehow passed the Senate, it would be vetoed by the President. It's pure stubborn ignorance and  obliviousness. The President is hampered here by the fact that he's a constitutional law professor and has read the document a few times. The President can recommend policy and the President gets to enforce the law, but the tax code and taxes begins in the House. The Debt Limit isn't like the filibuster where you can imagine a bill or a nomination so mindbogglingly awful to demand a response like it. It's a done deal, and all the spending cuts in the world -- most ill-advised, of course, can't fix that. We spent the money...now it's debt and "shall not be questioned."

A great deal of the discussion of this ploy, as with so many of the things coming from this version of the House, is easily summed up with the question "What the HELL are these fools thinking?" What they're thinking is that the last debt ceiling thing worked out so well for them, that they should just go for round 2 only with a bill that is unpassable and unconstitutional because, well, Michelle Bachman brought a Minnesota Hotpot and Mitch McConnell is sending over a couple of cases of the best Kentucky White Lightning.

 

Of course, what makes this particularly funny is that China is not even close to being our largest debt holder. If you do as they suggest, paying China first and then do the rest of it however they get around it it, the Republicans are screwing with the American people in order to benefit Asian-Commie-Atheists. I'm as fond of Asian-Chinese Commie Atheists as anybody, but this is probably not the way to show it.

The Republican strategy in this case actually will have the impact of hurting the economy and American business. If the bill were to become law -- which it won't -- the current accounts would be the thing that doesn't get paid. Defense Contractors are like everybody else -- they bill monthly and get paid eventually. So, Boeing, NGC, Lockheed and all the rest might have to lay off everybody.The ripple effect will be profound...More to come.  

 

The Confederacy of Dunces Forms a Chorus of Blissful Idiots

"It's criminal and scandalous that we are ignoring the effect of sequestration on our national security," he said. "Yeah, I'm glad to see all of the focus on     whether we have to wait in line longer, or there's flight delays, but I wish to God Congress would sometimes focus on the threats to our national security."

John McCain

 I've been amused by the complaints about nd Air Traffic Control and how awful it is that the President is selectively attacking the airline industry and the heartland by shuttering the various air traffic control towers around the country. Jackson Brown has a line in The Pretender "I'll be a happy idiot, and struggle for the legal tender..." Well, the Republicans in the House have done this to the nation and there are things more important than missed airline connections to Cousin's Fud's wedding happening. And yet, because that inconvenience touches people who will pick up the phone and call their Congressional Office, the idiots feel that someone has to be responsible. Some one is -- the person or persons who decided that the Sequestration process was a good thing and that they needed to actually implement it because they could. Now, there were Democrats who agreed to this so it could pass, but it was a lousy idea if implemented, but they assumed it was never going to be implemented.. IT WAS INTENTIONALLY A LOUSY IDEA! No fool would let this happen...no fool would let the government default on its debt. No fool would advocate tax cuts for the rich at the expense of the middle class. No fool would cut taxes based on a projected surplus ten years down the road. No fool ....but, a whole confederation of fools are capable of doing what no fool could do.

 

Curious as to why the sequestration is affecting air travel? Hell, it affects everything, and Congress knew it was going to happen. They just didn't bother to listen to people like the Secretary of Transportation who RUNS THE FAA when he said 

""What I'm trying to do is to wake up members of the Congress on the Republican side to the idea that they need to come to the table, offer a proposal so that we don't have to have this kind of calamity in air service in America." LaHood said members of Congress would quickly feel the heat. "Your phones are gonna start ringing off the hook," LaHood predicted. LaHood said a majority of the FAA's 47,000 employees, including air traffic controllers, would face furloughs of one day a week and, in some cases, two days a week, to close a $1 billion hole sequester would create in the Department of Transportation's budget."

He said this in February 2013. In English. Other people said the same sort of stuff. In English. To Congress. The whole concept of sequestration was to present such unpalatable options to Congress that they would find a way to work together to come up with something the nation could live with. Well, fooled us -- not only are the Republicans unable to do arithmetic competently, they don't understand English. Of course, they're busy hiring interns to do the whole sexual exploitation thing, and introducing bills accusing Michelle Obama of planning the Boston bombing and other things of great national importance.

 

You know, like it or not, we have a government that does a lot of stuff -- could do less, could do more -- but there are things that it has to do. And, laws actually have consequences beyond whether or not the incumbent gets re-elected. Consequences that are far more important. The best argument for campaign finance reform including public financing and spending limits is there...if they're not busy working the phones and do fundraisers, maybe they'll actually ask the simplest of questions -- "What exactly is this going to mean to my constituents?" since the only thing motivating these clowns is whether or not they're going to be primaried or re-elected. John McCain is fairly irate about the Sequestration. He should be, of course...he sees it as unfairly cutting defense; while I am not one to oppose Defense spending, it's taken a lot fewer shots than lots of other programs over the decades. Still, McCain despite his blinders, is on to something when he talks about sequestration. McCain has been talking about this for months, but he's only talked about the effect on Defense. McCain is perturbed that it took the Air Traffic Controller furlough to go into effect for Congress to wake up. Well, one thing these guys have done is make Phil Ochs a real prophet in upsidedownland...Ochs said when introducing his "Love Me, Love Me, Love Me I'm a Liberal!" that "You know what a liberal is? 10% to the left of center in good times...10% to the right of center when it affects him personally. And, now for a lesson in safe logic..." Well, now the Republicans have managed to turn themselves into mirror liberals, pushing for the little guy waiting to take off from Slippery Hollow International for an extra 20 minutes because the GOOBERMENT closed the control towers.

Well, if I thought they'd found Jesus, I'd be ok with this. Everyone is happy to see a sinner repent. But, let's not get excited here and mistake expedience for penance   I expect to hear some condescending words directed at McCain by the Republicans in the Senate who are fine with this disaster and think they can blame the President; something might get done on Air Traffic Controllers and some defense cuts; but it's all going to be piecemeal and stupid. The kid depending on the free breakfast subsidized by the DOA or the disabled Vet forced to wait longer by some exponential factor for a rating or the researcher this close, this bloody close to a cure for uterine cancer will just have to wait. The long term unemployed, the kid needing the student loan, the parents whose child was just sent home from Head Start because he lost in a lottery for a seat, the Fertilizer Factory waiting for the fire inspectors and OSHA will all have to wait..."10% to the right of center when,.,,"